In 2001 Prudential switched from a mutual to a public company, so they have an unusually high number of registered shareholders. Proactive shareholder engagement. Plant a tree… get a bio-friendly tote bag. Actively ask on proxy for comments. ‘Starbucks’ incentive – Offered registered shareholders to move to broker (reduce their expense). Continue Reading →

In part 2 of a post on facilitating votes and activism by retail shareowners I continue to speculate on what could be done to improve the situation by recalling some of the better features of major efforts to date and possible improvements that would help conscientious shareowners. As Mark Lathamreminded me after yesterday’s part 1,

We retail shareowners own all of the shares traded in the United States — 1/3 directly through buying shares and 2/3 indirectly through our investments in institutions like mutual and pension funds. Those two modes of ownership result in very different patterns of voting on director elections and other shareowner decisions…

Retail shareowners own about 1/3 of shares traded in the United States but vote only about 1/3 of the shares we own. As Nell Minow once quipped, “you can lead a shareholder to a lot of dense material, but you can’t make them read it.” (Video Friday: SEC Proxy Voting Roundtable) Our voting influence is much smaller than it could be. If more retail shareowners not only voted but participated in discussions on corporate governance and in filing shareholder proposals, that might lead to greater accountability of managers and boards. Continue Reading →

This guest post from Bruce Herbert of Investor Voice provides an overview of a simple majority vote counting shareholder initiative, which seeks to eliminate abstentions from the denominator in calculating votes as well as super majority threshold requirements that have not been approved by shareholders.

“Fair corporate suffrage is an important right that should attach to every equity security bought on a public exchange.”

Most California State employees and retirees have their retirement funds invested largely through two vehicles. CalPERS is the nation’s largest public pension, with almost $300B in assets. Many employees also have smaller amounts invested in CalHR‘s Savings Plus program, with assets of $10B. Both vehicles invest a large proportion of their funds in corporate stock, which carries voting power that can not only impact the value of the companies and potentially our retirement income but also the quality of our environment and our political framework.

Over the course of several decades the Department Labor and the SEC have ruled that proxy voting rights are assets. Fiduciaries of funds, such as CalPERS and Savings Plus, must ensure the underlying shares are voted for the benefit of the employees and retires whose funds they hold in trust. Continue Reading →

Guest post from Shriram Subramanian, founder of InGovern Research Services with the objective of facilitating shareholder activism by institutional investors and thereby enhancing corporate governance in India. Proxy Advisory Services, Corporate Governance Research, Risk Monitoring, and Proxy Services. India’s SEBI, through a circular dated March 24th, 2014, released a new set of disclosure guidelines to be followed by mutual funds. These guidelines will be applicable from April 1st, 2014. Some of the important guidelines are: Continue Reading →

Procter and Gamble $PG is one of the stocks in my portfolio. Their annual meeting is coming up on 10/8/2013. ProxyDemocracy.org had collected the votes of three funds when I checked on 10/1/2013. I voted with management 60% of the time. View Proxy Statement.